Every second, the Internet grows by nearly 30,000 gigabytes of publications worldwide. Internet users are exposed to dozens of advertisements every day. How do you effectively reach your target audience without your message getting lost among this huge mass of information?
If the visual aspect of your digital communication supports remains an important element, the textual content is nowadays at the heart of your marketing strategy. Through a judicious choice of words and persuasive writing techniques, copywriting improves your search engine referencing, strengthens your brand image and thus contributes to increasing your turnover.
Like many marketing concepts, the term copywriting (not to be confused with copyrighting) comes from Anglo-Saxon culture. In English, copy means "text" in the vocabulary of publishing and advertising, while writing means "to write". In French, we speak of copywriting, design-writing or web-writing.
Copywriting is the art of using words to seduce and convince in order to promote a brand, a company, a person, an idea, a product or a service.
The role of the copywriter or designer-editor is to push the reader to act with carefully selected words. This is different from the journalist or simple writer, who produce texts with a purely informative purpose. However, the two approaches tend to merge within the content marketing strategy, which now focuses on quality content to bring real added value to potential customers.
Through various persuasion techniques, such as the insertion of call-to-actions, copywriting aims to trigger a reaction from the Internet user, in an inbound marketing approach. This may involve making a purchase, but also a request for a quote, signing up for a newsletter or an event, opening an e-mail, making contact, reading an article, etc.
Copywriting is not a recent concept: in the 1950s, the first copywriters wrote the sales pages of newspapers and magazines. Today, with the advent of the Internet, copywriting is mainly applied on the web and is the keystone of your digital marketing. The copywriter is therefore involved in the writing of all your online media: the content of your site, blog articles, publications on social networks, e-mailings, product sheets, advertising campaigns, etc. You can also use copywriting to write the scripts for your videos or podcasts, to maximise the impact of your speech to your audience.
By respecting the rules of web copywriting and SEO (search engine optimization), copywriting allows you to better position yourself in the results pages of search engines. The integration of relevant keywords, semantic enrichment, HTML tagging, internal networking are all factors that contribute to a better indexing of your pages. Quality content, focused on the user experience, is indeed essential to meet the requirements of ranking algorithms, especially Google. Thanks to the improvement of your natural referencing, you will be able to reach your audience more easily and thus acquire qualified organic traffic.
Once you have reached your target, you then need to convince them and keep them loyal. To stand out from the competition, you must assert your specificity through a strong brand identity. This is built upstream through the development of your brand platform, which formalises the essential foundations of your company. In an ultra-connected world, users are more than ever in search of authenticity and human relations. Prospect conversion is thus facilitated when they share your company's vision and philosophy. An expert in the art of using words, the copywriter helps you grow your reputation through texts that reflect the values carried by your brand.
This is of course the ultimate goal of copywriting, and content marketing in general: making sales to increase your turnover. The improvement of your natural referencing, by bringing you visitors, and the work of branding, by making them aware of your values, contribute to this indirectly. Copywriting techniques are also a formidable weapon for turning your prospects into customers, by encouraging them to click on your advertisements, subscribe to your newsletter and buy your products or services. This is the best way toimprove the conversion rate of your pages and sales tunnels and thus your return on investment.
A true chameleon of the web, a good copywriter must be able to adjust the style and content of his speech:
Delivering impactful content implies knowing your persona perfectly, a sort of portrait-robot of the typical client defined in the company's global communication strategy. It also requires psychology to understand the target's needs, satisfy their desires and allay their fears. While of course remaining honest and consistent with the brand's editorial line, values and image it wishes to convey to its audience.
The multiplication of screens and the permanent solicitation caused by the intensive use of social networks have as a consequence a progressive decrease of our faculties of concentration. According to a study carried out by Microsoft in 2015, our capacity for sustained attention is limited to 8 seconds, one second less than a goldfish! In order to capture the interest of readers who are accustomed to zapping information, you need to focus on clear and structured content with high added value.
In particular, e-mail titles and subjects are of strategic importance: if 80% of Internet users read them, only 20% click on them. A copywritten title is therefore essential to attract the attention of your audience, make them want to read the rest of your articles and maximise the opening rate of your newsletters.
Simply objectively describing the features and benefits of your products or services is not enough to trigger the act of purchase. Indeed, to make his choice, the potential customer does not only base his choice on a rational evaluation, but also on his beliefs and his feelings. The copywriter must therefore create an emotional bond with the Internet user in order to win his heart and convince him to act. Words are powerful: used wisely, they have a real power of persuasion and can create a whole range of feelings.
One of the most effective ways of arousing emotion is to tell stories using the principle of storytelling. Originating in the United States, this marketing technique uses the narrative processes of storytelling to strengthen the reader's buy-in and make him or her more receptive to the underlying message. Storytelling can be used on an ad hoc basis, as a simple real or invented anecdote, or more globally in a company's communication strategy to shape its brand image.
Without necessarily being aware of it, each of us uses copywriting in everyday life. Writing a cover letter to seduce a recruiter, a classified ad to sell a car or an apartment, an e-mail to convince friends to accept an invitation... There are many examples of everyday situations that require persuasion.
However, not everyone can be a copywriter. To use a culinary analogy, it's not because you know how to cook that you can call yourself a great chef. As in gastronomy, the professional copywriter knows the recipes and masters the techniques to concoct three-star content that will delight readers.
On the other hand, learning copywriting takes time, because it is both an art and a science:
Curious, with a great general culture and excellent language skills, the experienced copywriter has the skills to deliver flawless content that will help you achieve your goals. As a privileged intermediary between your brand and your clients, the Autour de l'Image agency accompanies you to set up copywriting services that are perfectly adapted to your needs.
